Understanding Trauma and the Path to Healing - Part 1

Can our deepest pain become a doorway to healing?

Trauma is a wound—both literally and metaphorically. The Greek root of the word means "wound." In the psychological sense, trauma is an internal wound left by a deeply distressing experience that overwhelms our coping capacities and dysregulated the synchronised functioning of the organism. We couldn't process, make sense of and integrate what was happening. While we cannot change what happened to us, the good news is that we can heal from the effects it left within us.

In other words, trauma is the consequence one feels as a result of something that should have never happened (violation) or because of something that should happened, but it did not (neglect). A few people may experience the same event, but depending on their internal resources and support, one may be traumatised while others are not. This distinction is crucial. Trauma is not defined by the magnitude of the external event alone but by how our body and psyche respond when we feel helpless, unsafe, threatened, or rejected.

The Essence of Trauma is Disconnection

The primary consequence of trauma is disconnection and alienation from the self, our purpose, our relationship with others and the natural world we are a part of. Trauma symptoms show up in many ways: emotional numbing, hyper-reactivity, a lingering sense of shame or danger, and a tendency to repeat painful and hurtful patterns.

As a psychic wound, trauma interferes with our ability to grow and develop. Often, it locks us into survival responses: fight, flight, freeze, or fragment. These responses are not weaknesses but intelligent adaptations and survival strategies. However, when they persist long after the danger has passed, they constrict us, reduce us and prevent us from living fully.

The most intense pain as a consequence of trauma often lies beneath awareness, frozen and mute. Yet, it shows up in our relationships, our health, and our self-perception.

From "What's Wrong with You?" to "What Happened to You?"

This shift in perspective from blaming individuals for their symptoms to understanding the context of their pain is vital.

Trauma-informed approaches recognise that the problem is not that something is inherently wrong with the person but that something painful happened to them and that the wound has not yet been fully attended to and healed.

Trauma often leaves us with the feeling: "I want to be somewhere else." It's a resistance to the present moment and, often, to grief. Yet grieving is the natural healing response to loss. Trauma work is, in part, a form of grief work. It's about finding safe, supported ways to finally feel what was once unbearable or profoundly missing.

Healing Is Reconnection

Healing is not about pushing away, letting go, forgetting or denying what happened. It's a process of returning to wholeness and integrity, a process of reconnecting to all parts of ourselves. Vulnerability, the capacity to be wounded, is also our gateway to healing, connection and growth. Like trees, plants, and all living things, we grow most when we are defenceless and vulnerable.

We're often taught from an early age to suppress strong emotions rather than regulate them. As adults, we carry the legacy of this disconnection, mistaking our inner sensations and valid needs for threats and avoiding them through addictions or distractions.

The work of trauma healing begins with creating safety, not as the absence of threat, but the presence of connection. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk reminds us that "Neuroscience research shows that the only way we can change the way we feel is by becoming aware of our inner experience and learning to befriend what is going on inside ourselves."

Research indicates that the quality of social support and emotional connections predicts (directly correlates) whether someone will develop PTSD or trauma responses or not. The therapy focuses on creating emotional safety and support, allowing clients to feel what was previously intolerable, connect with their aloneness and overwhelming vulnerability, and support them in moving through it in a way that helps restore resilience. No one grows and thrives while facing life alone.

A Systemic and Relational Journey

Healing doesn't happen in isolation. Trauma occurs in relationships and communities and must be healed there, too. We exist within systems - families, cultures, societies, that shape how we respond and how we recover. Every defence mechanism makes sense within the context of the ecosystem in which it is formed.

Healing must move through stages of systematic evolving: from traumatising to trauma-informed to trauma-responsive and, ultimately, trauma-restorative environments. In trauma-responsive environments, our nervous systems begin to recalibrate. We can risk vulnerability again. We can engage with life instead of merely surviving it. In trauma-restorative systems, it becomes safer to be as we are, to feel, relate, and grow.

From Pain to Wisdom

We are created with the capacity to transform our wounds into wisdom and tragedy into triumph. Trauma doesn't only scar us - it can shape us in meaningful ways. Post-traumatic growth occurs when we pause, reflect, reconnect, respond to our needs, and integrate new learning.

Healing from trauma requires compassion, both from others and ourselves. When compassion is present, people can begin to tell the truth about their experiences. When we stop blaming ourselves for having pain, we can finally hold it, learn from it and transform it….

The coming workshop offers in-depth understanding of trauma. Rooted in current trauma research and grounded in experiential practice, the workshop equips participants with practical tools to recognise and work with different types and levels of trauma. Through body-based awareness, relational depth, and guided emotional processing, participants will learn to support clients in stabilising and accessing their innate capacity for healing and growth.